An email arrived in my in-box Monday afternoon with the news that Devin Harris of the New Jersey Nets is now featured on an 80 by 60 foot billboard above the ESPN Zone on 42d Street and Broadway. That was preceded by another announcing Harris as the NBA’s Player of the Week. If Harris continues on the scoring binge (he dropped 47 Sunday night on the Suns in Phoenix) he’s been on, he will be an all-star by February. And Mark Cuban will have more insider trading explaining to do, of the basketball variety.
Cuban and his Dallas Mavericks fell in love with the legend of Jason Kidd last winter. They had to have the aging maestro for a title run that didn’t survive the first round of the playoffs. As a magnanimous gesture, Cuban’s negotiating team threw two first-round draft choices into a deal the Nets’ President Rod Thorn later said he would have made straight-up. With one of the picks, Thorn drafted a 6-10 forward out of California, Ryan Anderson, who has already ably demonstrated that he has an NBA future. Next year’s Dallas pick does not happen to be lottery protected – the Mavericks barely made the playoffs last season and have started this season as a .500 team.
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USC kicker David Buehler played his final game at the Coliseum last week.
But Saturday’s game against UCLA at the Rose Bowl also will have comfortable feel for the senior from Anaheim, who will be on the field for the fourth time in his USC career.
“I’ve kind of got accustomed to it as a home field away from the Coliseum,” said Buehler, who was selected Monday as the Pacific 10 Conference special teams player of the week.
Buehler kicked a 35-yard field goal and converted all five of his conversion attempts, and four of his seven kickoffs went for touchbacks in the Trojans’ 38-3 victory over Notre Dame.
It was the second time this season that Buehler earned conference recognition.
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The U.S. credit-card industry may pull back well over $2 trillion of lines over the next 18 months due to risk aversion and regulatory changes, leading to sharp declines in consumer spending, prominent banking analyst Meredith Whitney said.
The credit card is the second key source of consumer liquidity, the first being jobs, the Oppenheimer & Co analyst noted.
“In other words, we expect available consumer liquidity in the form of credit-card lines to decline by 45 percent.”
Bank of America Corp Citigroup Inc and JPMorgan Chase & Co represent over half of the estimated U.S. card outstandings as of September 30, and each company has discussed reducing card exposure or slowing growth, Whitney said.
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said on Monday the government was working on new programs to stimulate lending and expressed impatience that banks were not making more credit available.
Speaking to a Fortune 500 Forum, Paulson warned “a severe financial crisis” has yet to run its course but said Treasury was not relenting in its efforts to get the financial system onto a better footing that might bring stability.
“We are actively engaged in developing additional programs to strengthen our financial system so that lending flows into our economy,” he said, without offering any details. “When these programs are ready for implementation, we will discuss them with the Congress and the next administration.”
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Tessera Technologies Inc., a Silicon Valley company specializing in semiconductor packaging, suffered a setback that rocked its share price when an International Trade Commission judge said six big chip makers did not infringe two of its patents.
The ruling is a victory for defendants Qualcomm Inc., Motorola Inc., Spansion Inc., STMicroelectronics N.V., Freescale Semiconductor Inc. and ATI Technologies, a company purchased in 2006 by Advanced Micro Devices Inc. The commission’s administrative law judge found that Tessera’s patents were valid, but not infringed by the defendants. “It’s a great result,” said Alex Rogers, Qualcomm’s senior vice president and legal counsel.
Henry Nothhaft, Tessera’s president and chief executive officer, said it was disappointed by the decision. Tessera has the option of appealing to the full commission; Mr. Northhaft said his company will study the ruling before taking further action.
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